New York: Federal prosecutors have doubled the amount of profit allegedly made by Sri-Lankan born multibillionaire Raj Rajaratnam through his insider trading schemes.
Rajaratnam's profits in the schemes, described as the largest insider trading case in the history of US, were about USD 36 million, the prosecutors said.
"The government now has evidence that Rajaratnam's illicit gains yielded profits that were at least twice as large as those previously alleged," Assistant US Attorney Joshua Klein wrote in a court filing.
Earlier, the investigators said Rajaratnam, 52, got USD 17 million from the broad insider trading scheme. In October, Galleon Group LLC founder Rajaratnam was charged in one of the country's largest insider-trading case. Galleon Group is a hedge fund with up to USD 7 billion in assets under management.
He received 12 charges, four counts of conspiracy and eight counts of security fraud.
"People will probably ask just how pervasive is insider trading these days? Is this just the tip of the iceberg?" Preet Bharara, the US attorney for the Southern District of New York, had said previously, adding "We aim to find out."
Out of 21 persons charged in the case, six have already pleaded guilty and cooperating with the authorities making the case against Rajaratnam stronger.
Between March and July 2006, Rajaratnam had allegedly made USD 19 million in profits from information about the acquisition given to him by former McKinsey partner Anil
Kumar, an Indian-American, who has also been charged in the case.
Refuting the charges, Rajaratnam's lawyer John Dowd said that the press had already reported that AMD would acquire ATI, an investment company formed by the government of Abu Dhabi, in October 2008.
The prosecutors are also opposing Rajaratnam's bid for reduced bail as there is persisting fear that he will flee to Sri Lanka.
In December, Rajaratnman pleaded not guilty to all charges in the insider trading scandal that involves USD 52 million.
The billionaire has also been sued by the US Securities and Exchange Commission for illegal profits made from stock trades based on inside information.
Not only Rajaratnman is the central suspect in the largest insider trading case in US history, the businessman has also been sued for financing the Liberation Tigers of
Tamil Eelam.
PTI
First Published: Thursday, January 07, 2010, 11:04